ANA and JAL Finalize Aircraft Orders, Virgin Australia Announces Plans to Terminate Tokyo Route & More

Welcome to the July 26, 2024, edition of the This Week in Japanese Aviation newsletter!

Most notably, both ANA and JAL announced new aircraft orders at the Farnborough International Airshow. While the former ordered refurbished Dash 8 Q400s to replace its older airframes of the same type, the latter finalized major orders with both Boeing and Airbus.

Continue reading to see what else happened in Japan’s aviation industry over the last seven days.

While the highlights are below, other things happened too. As such, make sure to stop by Japan Aviation Hub (I revamped the top page to be more organized and include more news).

Routes

Cebu Pacific will launch Cebu - Osaka Kansai on October 15, 2024. The flights will operate four times a week.

Qingdao Airlines will launch Qingdao - Osaka Kansai on July 25, 2024. The airline will connect the cities three times a week.

Xiamen Airlines will launch daily flights between Hangzhou and Nagoya Chubu on September 20, 2024. It will be the airline’s first route to Chubu.

Greater Bay Airlines is expected to launch Hong Kong - Tottori, potentially as early as in October 2024. Before that, the airline will operate charters on the route in August.

Virgin Australia will stop flying between Cairns and Tokyo Haneda from February 24, 2025, citing low demand for travel from Japan to Australia as the reason.

Fleets

JCAS Airways signed a letter of intent for the lease of an ATR 72 with Avation. The start-up airline plans to take delivery of the aircraft in 2025 and use it for Osaka - Toyama and Yonago routes.

ANA ordered 7 refurbished Dash 8 Q400s from De Havilland Canada. The aircraft will be delivered from 2025 onward and replace the airline’s older airframes of the same type.

JAL finalized orders for 10 Boeing 787-9s and 31 Airbus A350-900 and A321neo aircraft first revealed in March of this year. The Boeing order also includes options for 10 more airframes.

PaxEx

JAL will temporarily limit the meal service on its flights from Boston and Dallas to Tokyo due to its caterer’s major strike. The reduced service will be in effect indefinitely (i.e., until the strike ends) from July 30, 2024.

Operations

Narita received 5,000 kiloliters of jet fuel from South Korea in early June amid a domestic fuel shortage. The fuel was imported by the trading house Itochu.

Japan’s transport ministry will lift the ban on using take-off sequence numbers in early August 2024. The ban was introduced after the deadly January 2024 runway collision accident at Tokyo Haneda Airport.

Did You Know That…

While earlier this year Toki Air became the first independent Japanese start-up airline to launch since Fuji Dream Airlines, there was an attempt to do so before that. Link Airs was established in Kyushu in 2012 with the intention of operating ATR 72s.

At one point, there was even an aircraft in the airline’s full livery almost ready for delivery. That never took place, though, as the company ran out of funds and filed for bankruptcy in 2014.

That’s it for this week - thank you for reading and have a great week!

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